“So you can’t find his master, my dear? Very well, then, we may keep him till he is claimed. He mustn’t stay out all night. Take him to Greycoat’s shed, and give him some hay and a pail of water.”
The next morning George came to fetch me out of the shed, and gave me some breakfast. Then he put on the halter, and took me round to the cottage door. The old woman put a light pack-saddle on my back and mounted. Then George brought her a basket of vegetables, which she took on her knee, and we set off to market. Nobody in this market-town had ever seen or heard of me, and I came back joyfully to my new home.
I lived there for four years, and was very happy. I did my work well and never did anybody any harm. I loved my good old mistress and my little master. They never beat me or overworked me, and they gave me the best food they could. We donkeys are not dainty. The outside leaves of vegetables and plants that cows and horses won’t eat, and hay and potato-peel and carrots and turnips, are all we need.
CHAPTER III.
On some days, however, I was not so happy, for my mistress, now and then, hired me out to the children in the neighborhood. She was not well off, and on the days when she had nothing for me to do she was glad to earn something in this way.
And the people who hired me were not always good to me, as the following story will show:—
There were six donkeys in a row in the courtyard; I was the strongest and one of the most beautiful. Three little girls brought us oats in a bucket; as I ate I listened to the children talking.